The Higher Speed Ethernet Fabrics for MicroTCA.0 and AMC.2 committee is working to bring 40 GbE to these specifications. The specification currently runs at up to 10 GbE levels per 10GBASE-KX and 10GBASE-KR. There are several pieces involved in this effort, and careful attention has been made to its effect on related specifications.

With Ethernet speeds advancing past 40G to 100G and higher, designers of systems such as AdvancedTCA (ATCA) meticulously follow activities in the IEEE 802.3 Ethernet subcommittee for any indicators on the future of backplane-based systems. In this interview with John D’Ambrosia, IEEE P802.3bs Chair, Chairman of the Ethernet Alliance, and Dell’s Chief Ethernet Evangelist, he discusses the development and deployment of the recently released 100GBASE-KR4 and -KP4 specifications, as well as the beginnings of IEEE work on 400G Ethernet and beyond.

The extensions include; a dual-sided shelf that can hold up to 28 Front Boards (existing ATCA boards) in a 19" cabinet, new board types, additional power and cooling, options for data center optimized input voltage range, and an increase in the Base Interface bandwidth. All of these extensions to ATCA were developed with backward compatibility in mind.

Typical embedded applications include video transcoding, image analysis and recognition, high speed physics experiments, wireless test, simulations and encryption/decryption where size, modularity, environmental requirements and power consumption make it impractical to use standard server based equipment.

With power and cooling support for up to 400 W per slot and up to 500 W in a single slot configuration, the new Centellis 2100 enables systems integrators to increase performance and I/O bandwidth per slot, while preparing for future performance upgrades that will have increasing power and cooling requirements.

With a 14-slot backplane supporting 40GbE communication between ATCA blades and front-to-rear cooling, the PXS1340 13U AdvancedTCA Shelf is ideal for high-end telecom, defense, networking, and communications applications. Designed to meet NEBS, the PXS1340 provides full redundancy of all Field Replaceable Units.